Australians are trapped in the most prolonged per capita recession on record, following six consecutive quarterly declines in per capita GDP and seven declines over the preceding eight quarters. The International Monetary Fund’s latest World Economic Outlook report forecasts that the Australian economy will grow by just 1.2% in 2024, compared with its April forecast
The Market Ear with some charts. Beware rising wedges SPX is trading tighter and tighter into the rising wedge. Highs have been losing momentum for some time and have been unable to push “properly” higher. Watch the steep short term trend line that has been in place since August lows. A close below and things
Over the weekend, Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan chose the wealthy suburb of Brighton to launch her plan of seizing planning controls away from local councils to create 50 activity centres the government has earmarked for higher density. These areas will be rezoned for high-rise apartment complexes of 10 to 20 storeys near train and tram
Goldman cracking a joke about Chinese property. Going into the fifth year of the current downturn, we summarize our outlook for the China property industry in the following three points: 1) We are finally at an inflection point of the ongoing downward spiral in the housing market on the back of a comprehensive and coordinated
SHFE and SGX are stuck on a ledge: Mad Dalian likewise: There is no steel recovery coming, sorry. WorldSteel: Africa produced 1.9 Mt in September 2024, up 2.6% on September 2023. Asia and Oceania produced 105.3 Mt, down 5.0%. The EU (27) produced 10.5 Mt, up 0.3%. Europe, Other produced 3.6 Mt, up 4.1%. The
Another listless night on risk markets with a no significant economic data to impact events with both European stocks and Wall Street largely unchanged while the USD continued to strengthen. Euro broke below the 1.08 level, while the USDJPY pair jumped through the 151 handle while the Australian dollar is trying to firm at the
Behold the DXY express elevator: And AUD lift to hell: North Asia is no help: Gold and DXY do not move like this together. Either the world is about to end or the gold bubble is: Metals are fighting the king: Miners not so much: Nor EM: The junk siren just went off for risk:
Six months before the 2022 federal election, Anthony Albanese waxed lyrical about how a Labor government would tackle housing affordability: Albanese said that “Australians who work-full time should be able to afford a house or cover the rent”. “20 years ago, the average home cost 4 times the average salary. Now it’s more than 7
The housing industry and YIMBYs argue that Australia’s shortage of housing could be solved by rezoning our cities for greater densities, thereby allowing apartments to be built in the ‘missing middle’ of our cities. However, their simplistic claims ignore the fact that construction costs have soared by around 40% since the beginning of the pandemic:
Asian stock markets are again very mixed with a poor lead from Wall Street overnight not helping, neither is the impact of the latest PBOC rate cut with very little for risk markets to go on. Futures are indicating a flat or lower start for European stocks which are likely to be muted again without